She had me open my mouth. She inserted a funnel and pushed it into my throat almost choking me. Abigail used the ladle to drop a dollop of very cold, ...our tasting gruel into my mouth. I could not live only on this stuff and as I choked it down I wanted to spit it in her face.“Saint Catherine of Sienna healed the sick, wore no clothes and took no food except the offering of Christ for seven years,” she told me. I didn’t believe her but I had no way to prove otherwise. She told me to swallow. " She thanked God for me for entering her life and filling it with joy and light. She recounted my old-fashioned ways that made her curious. She went on to me for leading her to Jesus and salvation. She thanked me for giving her words to hear like "Mom," "Mommy," "son," and "daughter," when she became my wife. She finished by thanking God for the wonderful man to stand beside who is her husband. When she finished and said, "Amen," to much echoing, there wasn't a dry eye in the house. The cake. .." she began falteringly. Her hand encircled and hugged my tube. She swallowed thickly. "It's not so easy for me... to open up that way." I know," I whispered, aware of the same problem within myself. As I lay on my side watching her I sensed in her careful, delicately urging fingers and her disquieted tone, our mutual need to coax reassurance from weary flesh.After a long moment of pulling and squeezing, Martha said, "you're still not really hard yet. Are you too tired?" I'm tired, but... now. A girl could get used to that. I sighed and put my daydreams away and went out to face the real world.Mark staggered in about twenty minutes later. I suspect he’d lost what little he had left in his stomach getting out of those clothes. The shower ran for an inordinately long time but I just sat at the table, sitting coffee. He finally dragged himself into the kitchen. The most apt description of how he looked was ‘like shit’, words I never thought I’d use to describe my husband. I got him a.